


As Time Goes By

by Oshusta



Series: The Entitled Series [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Ambition, Attempted Murder, Character Death, Delusionment, Funeral, God-parent! Peggy, God-parent! Steve, Reflection, Selfishness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-19
Packaged: 2019-01-19 15:12:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12412713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oshusta/pseuds/Oshusta
Summary: Howard Stark is a simple man, and he has purpose. He just needs a little more time to get it right…(Prequel to “Entitled")





	As Time Goes By

** July 16, 1973 **

Howard Stark is a simple man.

He’s never claimed that way, especially not by the public, as they have the man confused with the life he led, which was admittedly complicated.

There’s a difference between the two, but the media can’t discern it, and the media influences the publics own opinions, so with that, everybody believes he’s a complicated man.

Even the new director of the Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division does, so-called Nicholas Joseph Fury, who shows a lot of promise, even with his past of hardship and mystery. Hesitantly, Howard accepts him. Spies are bound to have their own secrets anyway, even if they aren’t worth keeping.

Steve approves of him, along with Peggy, so the deal is sealed. Can’t go back now.

Howard concludes that Fury is intimidated by him through a letter in the mail. He never opens mail himself, but as Jarvis had pointed out, it seems rather suspicious. The butler politely leaves it for Howard to open.

Howard fumbles to find a letter opener for a moment before he tears the seal on the envelope and pulls the paper out.

Howard isn’t sure what he’s expecting, but it isn’t a hand-written letter from Fury himself requesting a business meeting on behalf of the agency division. He stares at the paper for a moment in puzzlement. Hell, if the guy wanted a meeting, he could’ve knocked on the door! Formality is only a front, after all. Besides, Howard’s a modern man – what was letter-writing to him?

To prove his point, albeit a little smugly, Howard swivels in his rich, leather, office chair and reaches for the telephone, dialling the agency’s number that would bring him to speaking with Nick.

“Hello there, Suzie,” he sing-songs into the phone, “It’s Howard here, may I speak to Fury?”

“Ah, of course Mr. Stark!” Suzie (which is most likely not her name, he’d just said it randomly) stutters, and with a beep, he’s directed to a different line.

“Hello?” Fury’s voice echoes through the phone.

“Nick – greetings. I got your letter on my desk, about the, uh, meeting. What was it you’d like to discuss?”

“With all due respect, Stark, I’d prefer to discuss my plans in person. It concerns the future success of the agency, and I would think it should be kept out of on-listeners’ ears.” He responds, exasperatedly.

“But of course.” Howard replies, waving his hand dismissively, despite himself, “I’ll come in tomorrow afternoon then? The barracks?”

“By all means.” Fury says drily, before hanging up.

Howard whistles, dropping the telephone back on the receiver.

He hopes it isn’t about his reputation. God, he doesn’t need another director scolding him about his public persona. But if it’s weapons, he can handle it. Mass-production was always his thing, anyway.

God, he needs an extra couple of years if he plans to stay in the business for the agency. Trusting people not to meddle with his designs is damn-near impossible.

*

** January 22, 1992 **

Steve supposes it was only a matter of time that Howard passed on. He’d always demanded more, pushing past the limits of any regular man in life, and created enemies easily, but it’s a tragedy that he’d had to die so ironically.

Steve turns his gaze to little Anthony, hiding his face in Peggy’s hip. She’s stroking his hair, a look of sorrow covering her features. As his god-parent, she’d would be left with caring for the remaining Stark.

Steve turns to gaze at the two fresh gravestones. Howard had dragged Maria with him along the way, on the road of his complex life, so of course she had joined him in death.

When they’d married, Steve had wished them well. He hadn’t thought that Howard could settle down to a have a wife and family at all, but the billionaire didn’t take unkindly to Maria when she showed interest past his media façade and financial success. Steve had been glad a gal finally took in his pal as a person, and it also helped that the two got along. Maria is… _was_ a kind-hearted and smart, and it was difficult not to like her.  So, when they married, nobody blinked.

As it was though, Maria was also a futurist, and didn’t try and persuade otherwise when Howard began experimenting with the serum that Steve had been injected with back in the day.

Steve didn’t think when Howard invited him over, saying he had to show him a project he was working on, that it would “shape the future”. After a while, that description lost its effect, because everything Howard made was as such, even if it was accurate.

When he arrived at the Stark manor, Jarvis directed him down to Howard’s lab with a barely hidden urgency that baffled Steve.

When he stepped inside, he understood. Howard had devoted his life, not only to his own company, but to the agency he’d helped found, and when people asked for more, that was usually what the engineer gave them.

There was a space cleared at the far end of the lab, which was filled with tubes and panelling that connected from a control board to a chamber that would be able to hold somebody willing enough to have the sinister looking needles at the arm of it stabbed into them.

Howard seemed to be prepping the mechanism, and it appeared ready to go. Except that there wasn’t anybody to step inside the chamber. Unless…

“If you’re planning for either one of us to go in there, you better not be.” Steve gritted out, fists clenched tightly by his sides.

Howard glanced up at him and gave a dry chuckle, before busying himself.

“Relax, Cap,” Howard told him, “This isn’t the regular serum.”

“Care to explain?”

“Lately,” Howard began, his tone suggesting he wasn’t exactly answering Steve’s question, “I’ve been discovering that there’s many things that I can’t achieve due to the obsolete technology of this time.”

“Obsolete?” Steve questioned in disbelief. Howard nodded once, before walking around to inspect the cuffs of the chamber.

“I’ve made many calculations and completed formulas that can’t be engineered into existence all because of it. And if I keep living the way I do…” he paused, bending down behind the chamber to connect a tube to the back, “Then I’ll die before I get a chance to.”

“And you’ve decided that taking these measures are your only choice?” Steve asked, displeased.

“I reviewed my choices, Rogers,” Howard stated, standing up and finally looking him in the eye, “So I took the initiative. This will work, I assure you.”

“I can’t stand with you on this, Stark.” Steve said firmly, jaw set.

“You don’t have to, but if I have a chance to fulfil this…the world will become better. I want you to understand this.”

Without another word, Steve left.

Maybe he’d been hypocritical, but Steve had volunteered himself for the serum for the war effort, since he wasn’t much help beforehand, and his success was for a world-wide cause, not for one’s own selfish desires to live longer.

He feared for Howard, but he knew he couldn’t stop him. It wasn’t his choice, and he couldn’t control him.

The success in bringing an agency division to life that would try and prevent organisations like HYDRA in the War kept Steve busy.

As celebration of the official start-up of the company, they put their efforts into a memorial for agents that died in honour, and gathered the few founders and executives to unearth it to the public. Howard should’ve been beside the him and the other founders.

Steve didn’t stay long after the fabric was pulled off the ‘Wall of Valor’, but he did see it in the paper the next week and made sure to pin it up.

By that point, Steve hadn’t heard from him in weeks, so he had no idea if the injection had gone as planned or if he was well – he certainly wasn’t dead, otherwise it’d be everywhere.

Steve, having continuously thinking over his reaction to Howard’s revelation, deemed that what he had done had been in poor taste. Howard had always meant well, and he only wished to stay longer to finish what he’d started, which was to improve the world. Steve hadn’t been very supportive of the notion, and had been a poor friend.

Driven to a point of guilt, Steve drove to the Stark manor again, thinking of ways he could apologise to his companion. Jarvis met him somewhat hesitantly at the door.

“Mr. Stark is currently in a meeting with Obadiah Stane, Steve,” Jarvis had told him, “I’m not sure they’d like to be interrupted.”

“I’ll just tell Howard I’m here, I promise.” Steve assured, though Jarvis still hadn’t looked pleased; but he didn’t protest any further.

Steve headed towards the sound-proof office. He had planned to listen in to see if it would be alright to interrupt when he remembered he wouldn’t catch a thing, but the door had been left slightly ajar.

“- a shame really, that you had to push me out of deputy position, because then I wouldn’t have to be forced to take such…drastic measures.” Stane’s voice filtered through, and Steve tensed. What was he doing?

“What are you talking about?” Howard asked, sounding agitated.

“Don’t worry, this won’t hurt a bit.” Stane said, and Steve had lunged for the door.

Obadiah had pulled a gun out of the holster concealed by his suit-jacket, and was lifting his arm to aim at a startled Howard. They both hadn’t expected to see Steve, and whirled to face him in surprise.

A bullet grazed his shoulder, but Steve dodged out of the way before Obadiah could fire a second round. Then he was within arm’s reach of the man. Steve twisted the offending arm around and pinned it to his back, the gun falling to the floor with a clatter.

“You’re under arrest.” Steve had growled, and Stane spat gracelessly.

They’d gone to court, and somehow, with Stark’s overpowering wealth and Steve as witness and accuser, they’d won and Stane had gone behind bars.

Howard had escaped death then, but he hasn’t now.

And his death _is_ everywhere. The Starks’ are infamous, and it’s portrayed as a tragedy everywhere across the globe, as it should be.

There was no use for the serum in Howard’s life. He had been right, he died because he continued to live the life he did, pushing too far and striving for more. He couldn’t protect himself from outside threats, like a slippery road in the middle of the night.

Steve’s only anger is that they left Tony without them.

In a way, Peggy would be a better parent than the both were combined. Maria was caring, but she was simply a busy woman. There were charities, galas, balls and banquets…They really didn’t have time for a child, however much they may have wanted one. Less really is more. And Tony, Steve found, requires a lot of attention, especially now.

And although Steve wants and almost _needs_ to be there for Tony, he finds he can’t devote his all to the kid. He isn’t Steve’s, after all, and Steve needs some form of physical exertion in his life on the crime-fighting front.

He may be selfish for leaving all of Tony’s care to Peggy, but she’s his legal guardian and god-parent, and sometimes he feels like he’s smothering her. Besides, with her retirement and family life, she’s become more domestic, and it’s not what he’s used to.

He’d missed out on his chance to marry her, and he doesn’t want to throw it in her face. Besides, she’d said herself that Steve needed to live his life, seeing as he’d be sticking around for a while. He also found it painful to watch her age as he only looked somewhat ten years older than he had in the 40’s, which was saying a lot, since it had been fifty years, give or take.

The new director, Fury seemed wary to assign Steve to any mission at all. Steve understands that he’s a little wary of everyone, being newly appointed after the death of Rick Stoner, who’d been his pal and the first director, but Steve’s impatient.

Fury obliges, giving him a file titling ‘Nuclear Experimentalists – Iran’, and Steve is immediately interested, since it feels kind of personal with the whole Manhattan Project during World War Two.

It’s an un-authorised project, and his orders are to take the sight down and arrest the scientists getting too enthusiastic with some deadly formulas.

He comes home triumphant, ready for more work. Not once does he think it will dig him a hole that’ll get him cornered in the future.

Not once does he think his first mission in Iran will come back to bite him in many more ways than just one.

*

_Come out upon my seas,_

_Cursed missed opportunities,_

_Am I part of the cure?_

_Or am I a part of the disease? Singing_

…

  Clocks, Coldplay

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I had written this ages ago as a prologue, but it didn’t fit in with the story (which is bad). I just like this universe though so I’m going to keep posting stuff in it (probably).
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed this depressant.


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